A loud mechanical clunk echoed in the recording, followed by Mark’s heavy breathing.
“They just locked onto my aircraft. I’m over the drop zone. The coordinates are embedded in this file’s metadata. The next transfer is happening on the 11th. You have to stop them, Sarah. You’re the only one who can fly the prototype. I love you. I’m sorry.”
The recording abruptly cut to dead air.
I stared at the screen, the silence in my bedroom ringing in my ears.
Today was the 11th.
The transfer was happening tonight.
And Colonel Vance now knew exactly where I lived.
CHAPTER 2
The digital clock on my dashboard read 4:15 PM as I pulled into the sprawling, highly secured campus of Aerodyne Defense Systems.
The San Diego sun was beginning to dip, casting long, harsh shadows across the acres of concrete and razor wire. I swiped my top-tier security badge at the main gate, the heavy iron barrier sliding back to let my Jeep through.
For the last year, Aerodyne had been my sanctuary. When I left the Navy, the CEO—a retired admiral who had flown with my father—offered me a position as the chief civilian test pilot for their experimental aerospace division. I spent my days testing classified electronic warfare upgrades on modified military jets before they were sold back to the Pentagon.
It was dangerous, highly technical work, but it kept me in the sky, and it kept me away from the military brass who had lied to my face.
I parked near Hangar 4, the massive corrugated steel building where my current project was housed. I grabbed my backpack from the passenger seat. Inside, wrapped in a static-proof bag, was Mark’s SD card.
The hangar was a cavernous, echoing space smelling of aviation fuel, hot metal, and industrial solvent. Sitting in the center of the bay, bathed in harsh overhead halogen lights, was the pride of Aerodyne: a heavily modified, pitch-black F/A-18 Super Hornet. It was stripped of its standard military markings, painted in radar-absorbent stealth coating, and fitted with the absolute latest in experimental Aegis jamming technology.
It was a ghost ship. It was designed to fly into heavily monitored airspace, scramble every radar system within fifty miles, and vanish without a trace.
I walked past the aircraft, my boots clicking against the polished concrete, and headed straight for the glass-walled engineering office at the back of the hangar.
Marcus, my lead flight engineer, was sitting at his terminal, surrounded by empty energy drink cans and glowing monitors. He was a brilliant, deeply cynical man in his late fifties who preferred machines to people.
“Sarah,” Marcus grunted without looking away from his screens as I walked in. “You’re here late. The flight tests for the jammer aren't scheduled until Thursday.”
“Change of plans,” I said, dropping my backpack on his desk. “I need you to pull the metadata off a file for me. Off the grid. No logging it on the company server.”
Marcus stopped typing. He slowly spun his chair around, pulling his reading glasses down to the bridge of his nose. He looked at me, taking in my pale face and tight posture.
“Off the grid?” he repeated, his voice dropping to a cautious whisper. “Sarah, we work for a defense contractor. Everything is on the grid. If I bypass the firewall, security will flag it.”
“You built the firewall, Marcus. I know you can bypass it,” I said, leaning over his desk. “This is life or death. Please.”
He stared at me for a long moment, seeing the desperation I couldn't completely hide. With a heavy sigh, he reached under his desk, pulling out a standalone, thick black laptop that wasn't connected to the network.
“Give it to me,” he said.
I handed him the SD card. He plugged it in, his fingers flying across the keyboard in a blur of keystrokes. Lines of green code cascaded down the black screen.
“Audio file. Encrypted,” Marcus muttered, his eyes tracking the data. “Whoever locked this down used military-grade algorithms. Where did you get this?”
“It was Mark’s.”
Marcus’s hands stopped completely. He looked up at me, his face suddenly pale. He knew Mark. He had attended the funeral.
“I’m extracting the metadata now,” Marcus said softly, his voice devoid of its usual sarcasm.
A string of numbers populated the center of the screen.